I have always been a runner, even if I'm not the fastest. For my 35th birthday, I ran a half marathon. In 2020, I set my sights on a duathlon or a triathalon. As I was training, I started to notice that I was struggling with some of my runs on hills and occasional pain in my left leg. As a physical therapist, I was self-assessing and treating until the night pain started and the lump I found was growing. October 18, 2020, I told my husband, "I think I have cancer." After multiple patient advocacy efforts, met with a surgeon on December 7th and opted for removal. While I had an MRI on December 28th to find out what we were working with, I saw "Steve" right there on the image. (We named him Steve as a reference to a quote in Over the Hedge- a kids movie to make it less scary).
On February 3, 2021, Steve was first evicted at a general hospital. But then I received the call. "I don't know how to tell you this but it's cancer. Grade IV sarcoma. If you were my family member I'd get in somewhere quickly." That's where my team at Penn came into the picture. I remember the peace I felt when I met with the team initially on February 19 and I continue to feel peace as I navigate this journey!
Two years into the diagnosis, I developed a metastasis to my lung. Taking tissue out of my leg and now my lung has impacted my ability to run. This race for me defines multiple things - one - I can still RUN. While it might look different and while I may still have a journey ahead, I am privileged. I want to raise money for research. We need to find more ways for limb sparing and also for killing these cancer cells as right now it's predominately through surgery and removal.
